Forbidden Fruit
by Leca B
Summary: "She was the oracle. She had predicted his happy ending. And now she got to have privileged visions of his brilliant life without her." Rachel-fic. Percabeth mentioned. May be a little OOC.


So... Hey everyone! I'm going to be brief, since it's, like, 5:30 am. I got this idea stuck in my head since I saw last month's theme on the Veritas Monthly Challenge: Forbidden Fruit. Even though it's not really written with that intent. It's supposed to be Rachel, even though she's a bit out of character. Okay, maybe a LOT out of character, but oh, well…

I hope you enjoy it though. I mean, yeah, I wrote it in two hours, and it's short, but I like it, and I'd love to know what you guys think about it.

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"**Dismantle and dismember**

** Men's days and dreams, Juliette;**

**For love may not remember,**

** But time will not forget."**

**Rococo**

**by**

**Algernon Charles Swinburne**

**.**

**.**

She woke up screaming.

She shot upright in the bed, panting heavily. Her chest heaved up and down as she gasped repeatedly for air. She was shaking head to toe, and looked paler than what was humanly possible. Her breath was coming ragged, and she was freezing. She lifted a cold trembling hand to brush her damp hair out of her forehead, letting her palm rest against it for a minute, closing her eyes, trying to calm down. It took a few minutes, but she finally managed to soothe her raging emotions back into the usual ease they normally were.

These visions would be death of her.

It was like this every night. Ever since that fateful day two summers ago, where she had embraced her destiny and became the oracle. And it never ceased to amaze her how badly it affected her. She was supposed to have gotten over it ages ago. And for a few days she thought she had. She really did. She encouraged him to go and talk to her, and felt truly glad for the both of them, knowing that they deserved a happy ending, and they would indeed find it in one another.

Being right never hurt so much. And the oracle thing didn't make it any easier.

Nobody told her the day they had gotten together, but she knew it. It had been a particularly bad day for her, since her classmates in the "Lady School" had annoyed her all day about her unfashionable shoes, and her tangled messy hair, and how she had paint smudged on her shirt. She was incredibly tired, and decided to get an early sleep.

She had a dream.

She was underwater. She was wet, and cold, and her vision was blurry. Her eyes hurt. She was running out of breath, and she wanted to surface. But she couldn't. Something held her back. Her chest was starting to hurt from lack of air, but as much as she wanted, that thing wouldn't let go of her. It was as if it was waiting for the right moment. She had to see something. She had to see…

She saw. Two blurred blobs, so close they seemed to blend in together, it was hard to tell them apart. She forced her eyes. She had to see. She had to see better. She had to…

Black. And blonde. Black and blonde hair.

And as realization struck her, the pain in her chest became unbearable. For a terrifying moment she understood she was going to drown. She watched helplessly as the two blobs seemed to get more and more clear. She could make out their smiling faces, right before she collapsed.

She couldn't help it. That night, she cried like a baby.

And it didn't get any better with time.

The fates, she decided, are cruel.

She sighed tiredly, and risked a glance at her alarm clock. Three a.m. flashed in bright red numbers. She fought the urge to groan. These dreams would be the death of her, indeed. This would be the third night that week she stayed up because of them. She contemplated lying back, and trying to get some sleep, but she knew better than to do that. She had learned long ago that it wouldn't work. Those nightmares would only replay again and again in her head, until she begged for it to stop.

No, damn the sleep. She had to do the only thing that worked: Getting it out of her system.

And that's how she found herself standing in the middle of her room in the Big House, at six in the morning, brush and palette in hand, staring with wide, fixed eyes into a disturbing incomplete painting. Sunlight crept shyly into the room through the cracks in the curtains, and illuminated, even if poorly, the dark room, and seemed to highlight the bags under her eyes, and her lost expression.

She stared at the painting she had not managed to finish with some sort of scared look. It was as if she was afraid that if she looked hard enough, the characters in them would come to life and display before her what her dreams showed every night. But despite her fears, despite her desire to run back to her bed and curl up under the covers, she kept looking at the canvas in front of her.

It was incomplete, true, but it would be beautiful when it was finished. In the middle of the picture was a handsome man in his thirties, bearing the most mischievous grin in the world, staring at her with that look that said "Hey, I did something wrong, and I can't wait for you to find out." His figure was still just drawn, the only thing she had painted were his sea green eyes, that seemed to jump of the page as they glowed with mirth. She couldn't help the small smile that came to her lips, and she absent-mindedly raised her hand to brush across his face. She stopped midway, remembering the other part of the picture.

A blonde woman stared at her with a clearly exasperated face. She had painted her long curly hair, and had been in the middle of painting her blue blouse when she abandoned whatever thoughts she had of finishing it. It amazed herself how she had managed to put the exact expression of both annoyance and fondness in the woman's eyes so perfectly. Anyone who looked at it would catch the silent remark: "He's an idiot, but I love him."

She felt her heart clench. And it only got worse once she finally looked at the bottom of the canvas, the only thing she had painted fully.

Three kids, looking absolutely radiant. Two boys, and a little girl, staring at her right in the face, with sea green and grey eyes. Three… Adorable kids that looked every bit the trouble their parents must've been when they had their age. They were happy. She knew that much. They had grown up in a happy home, with caring parents, and all the love a kid deserves. She could see it in their eyes, all the stories their parents told them before sleeping, all the silly games that became tradition, the vacations-turned-into-disaster that they loved…

A happy ending. Just like she had predicted.

She felt her knees weaken, and she fell to the floor.

She was the oracle and she had predicted his happy ending. And now she got to have privileged visions of his brilliant life without her.

The fates… Are cruel.


End file.
